To commemorate the 31st anniversary of Chernobyl disaster, in April 2017 the art collective Food of War and Naviar Records organized Clouded Lands, a show which aimed to raise awareness on the consequences that such catastrophic events bring in people’s culture and everyday life.
For this event, Naviar’s community recreated sounds, atmospheres and moods of one of the areas which were mostly affected by the disaster: the region of Gomel, in Belarus.
Just 70 miles away from the nuclear disaster, the Gomel region is where the Soviet government used artillery shells filled with silver iodide to make rain clouds that would “wash out” radioactive particles which were drifting towards densely populated cities. Witnesses say that that day in 1986 they saw black rain falling from the sky. The nuclear fallout is said to have caused an 80% increase in disabled births in the area, and to this day huge areas around Gomel remain uninhabitable.
Participants had to reimagine atmospheres and moods from those days in Gomel, and translate them into sounds. All songs were made in 2 weeks or less.
This album contains a selection of music Naviar received for Clouded Lands: a sound installation with all music submitted to the project can be found at
www.naviarrecords.com/gomel-1986
The exhibition took place at Rich Mix, London, in April 2017.
ARTISTS:
Dirigent
soundcloud.com/project-dirigent
San Francisco based composer and performer Chris Christensen creates electronic music as 'dirigent'. Classically trained and with long interest in experimental music and the avant-garde he is drawn toward analog electronics and classic tape-studio techniques.
earthborn visions
soundcloud.com/earthborn_visions
A mongrel project born out of wide-ranging influences, with a particular affinity for any music that positively influences perception and thinking. We’re developing a hybrid style that occasionally references its parents while dipping its toes into the sea of aleatory, indeterminant composition. Exploring juxtapositions of sounds and styles, melodies and noise, planned and random acts, field recordings and electronics, analog and digital
IF
soundcloud.com/user-903530583
Matteo Gazzolo (Rome, 1962) is an actor, director, musician, sound designer (founder of Soundethers) from Italy; raised in an artistic family, Matteo studied acting training, poetry reading and jazz singing. He debuted in 1976 in his father's company and then worked in cinema, theater and television (Rai). Between '92 and '96 he was the solo voice of the Tony Scott's orchestra. He's been teaching theatrical techniques and text analysis since 1999. He organizes trainings and lectures on acting styles. Matteo lives in Sardinia (Italy) where he plays his stage productions, focusing on the relationship between music, sound technologies (live electronics) and speech.
In die Ferne
soundcloud.com/in_die_ferne
In die Ferne's first musical experiences date back to the late 80s -- playing the guitar in an utterly forgotten noise combo that only recorded 2 tracks. He started making electronic music in the early 2000s.
Jesús Lastra
soundcloud.com/jalastram
Jesús Lastra aka Jalastram/Flat Stone is a Madrid-based self-taught artist from Maracaibo, Venezuela. He began to experiment with audio editing software in 2007. Then, he started composing ambient music, or more specifically, soundscape, drone and experimental music within the electronic genre. Lastra has been part of Naviar Records Label since 2014.
Robert Rizzi
soundcloud.com/rizzi
Danish/American Composer and Soundartist, Master of Electronic Music Composition from DIEM, Aarhus. Robert teaches Electronic Music and Soundart at SDMK Music Conservatoire in Esbjerg, DK; he works primarily with field recordings, found scores and improvised instrumental pieces, very often in collaborative site specific installations and compositions with visual artists.